NAME

SYNOPSIS

DESCRIPTION

The aegis-Test command is used to run tests. If no files are named,
all relevant tests are run. By default both automatic and manual
tests are run.
You may name directories on the command line, and all relevant tests
in that directory tree in the change will be run. It is an error if
there are no relevant tests.
Each architecture must be tested separately. This is because there
may be subtle problems that are only revealed on some architectures.
Some projects may also have different code for different
architectures.
The status of the last test run is remembered so that tests are not
run if there is no need. (This does not apply to -REGression tests,
unfortunately.) Tests must be re-run if the test previously failed,
if the test file has changed, if there has been a build, and for each
architecture.
name=value
You can add name=value pairs to the command line, these will be passed
unchanged to the test command. Usually on the end of the command
line, but this can be changed in the project configuration file.
The -force option results in an implicit force=1 variable being added
to the list of variable assignments, and thus added to the end of the
command. This is of most use when using the batch_test_command filed
of the project configuration file.
This may initially look like a development process end-run, allowing
test scripts to be written so that they give all the right answers
without actually doing anything. You have always been able to do this
with environment variables, so this isn't anything new.
It is possible to get all of the variable assignments to turn into
environment variables by putting $var at the start of the command,
before the name of the shell, rather than at the default location at
the end of the command.
FileNameInterpretation
The aegis program will attempt to determine the project file names
from the file names given on the command line. All file names are
stored within aegis projects as relative to the root of the baseline
directory tree. The development directory and the integration
directory are shadows of this baseline directory, and so these
relative names apply here, too. Files named on the command line are
first converted to absolute paths if necessary. They are then
compared with the baseline path, the development directory path, and
the integration directory path, to determine a baseline-relative name.
It is an error if the file named is outside one of these directory
trees.
The -BAse_RElative option may be used to cause relative filenames to
be interpreted as relative to the baseline path; absolute filenames
will still be compared with the various paths in order to determine a
baseline-relative name.
The relative_filename_preference in the user configuration file may be
used to modify this default behavior. See aeuconf(5) for more
information.

TESTPROCESS

Each change is required to be accompanied by tests, and those tests
are required to be run against the built development directory, and
they must pass. This ensures that new functionality is accompanied by
tests to verify its correctness, and bug fixes are accompanied by
tests which confirm that the bug has been fixed.
RegressionTests
Tests are treated as any other source file, and are maintained in the
baseline and history with all other source files. The tests which
must accompany every change accumulate in the project baseline,
providing a definition of correct function for the baseline. These
accumulated tests may be executed using an "aegis -REGression"
command, to verify that the project will not "regress" as a result of
a change.
BaselineTests
Bug fixes are required to have their tests fail against the project
baseline (in contrast to the development directory). This ensures
that the test actually demonstrates the bug in the baseline, as well
as demonstrating that it is fixed by the change. New functionality
trivially fails against the baseline, and so aegis does not attempt to
guess if a test is a bug fix test or new functionality test, it simply
requires tests to fail against the baseline.
This requirement applies both to new tests being created by a change
and also to tests which have been copied into a change for
modification.
ReviewingTests
Reviewers may be confident that aegis has enforced the test
requirements; that a change must have tests, that the change must
build, that the tests pass against the development directory, and that
the tests fail against the baseline. These conditions are enforced by
aede(1) and the change will not be advanced to the beingreviewed
state until these conditions are met. Reviewers should thus review
tests for completeness of coverage of the code in the change, and
insensitivity to changes in the execution environment (e.g. not date
sensitive). Reviewers should also use "aegis -list change_details" to
verify that a change does or does not have testing exemptions.
Exemptions
Various test exemptions may be granted by project administrators, see
aepa(1) and aepattr(5) for more information. Copying tests into a
change, or adding new tests to a change, may cancel those exemptions.

TESTCOMMANDCONFIGURATION

The command used to execute tests is defined by the test_command field
in the project configuration file (see aepconf(5) for more
information), this defaults to using the Bourne shell if not set. The
current directory will be the top of the appropriate directory tree.
If tests require temporary files, they should create them in /tmp, as
a test cannot expect to have write permission in the current
directory.
If you want to use a more sophisticated test engine, rather than a
simple shell script, but this test engine does not return result codes
suitable for use with aegis, you could wrap it in a shell script which
re-writes the exit status into the values aegis expects. You could
also achieve the same results by writing a more complex test_command
in the project config file.
It is also possible to write test commands which are able to test more
than one file at once. This is controlled by the batch_test_command
field of the project config file. In this case, the ${output}
substitution indicates the name of a file the test command must
create, in aetest(5) format, to contain the results of the tests run.
This is often used on systems with multiple CPUs or the ability to
distribute jobs across several computers on a network.
Substitutions
All of the aesub(5) substitutions are available in the test commands.
Some of them are of particular note:
ARCHitecture
This substitution is replaced by the name of the architecture
to be tested.
Search_Path
This substitution is replaced by a colon separated list of
absolute paths to search when looking for test support files.
Search_Path_Executable
This substitution is replaced by a colon separated list of
absolute paths to search when looking for executable support
files (library files and sub-commands).
Most of the time $Search_Path_Executable are exactly the same.
However, during "aegis -t -bl" they will be different, with
$Seach_Path starting at the development directory (the test being run)
and $Seach_Path_Executable starting at the baseline (the executable
being run).
TestResultCodes
As each test is run (via the test_command field in the project config
file), aegis determines whether the test succeeded or failed by
looking at its exit status. This exit status is mostly as expected
for UNIX commands.
Success
A test should exit 0 to indicate success, i.e. that the specific
function under test worked as expected.
Failure
A test should exit 1 to indicate failure, i.e. that the specific
function under test did not work as expected.
No Result
A test should exit 2 to indicate no result, i.e. that the specific
function under test could not be exercised because something else
went wrong. For example, running out of disk space when creating
the test input files in the /tmp directory.
Skipped
A test should exit 77 to indicate that it was skipped. This is
usually to do with the current architecture not being meaningful.
Whenever possible, use "No Result" instead. (The value was chosen
for compatibility with other test systems.)
Actually, any exit code other than 0, 1 or 77 will be interpreted as
"no result". However, always using 0, 1, 2 or 77 means that if a new
result code is required by a later release of Aegis your existing
tests will continue to work.

TESTCORRELATIONS

The "aegis -Test -SUGgest" command may be used to have aegis suggest
suitable regression tests for your change, based on the source files
in your change. This automatically focuses testing effort to relevant
tests, reducing the number of regression tests necessary to be
confident that you have not introduced a bug.
The test correlations are generated by the "aegis -Integrate_Pass"
command, which associates each test in the change with each source
file in the change. Thus, each source file accumulates a list of
tests which have been associated with it in the past. This is not as
exact as code coverage analysis, but is a reasonable approximation in
practice.
The aecp(1) and aenf(1) commands are used to associate files with a
change. While they do not actively perform the association, these are
the files used by aeipass(1) and aet(1) to determine which source
files are associated with which tests.
TestCorrelationAccuracy
Assuming that the testing correlations are accurate and that the tests
are evenly distributed across the function space, there will be a less
than 1/number chance that a relevant test has not been run by the
"aegis -Test -SUGgest number" command. A small amount of noise is
added to the test weighting, so that unexpected things are sometimes
tested, and the same tests are not run every time.
Test correlation accuracy can be improved by ensuring that:
o Each change should be strongly focused, with no gratuitous file
inclusions. This avoids spurious correlations.
o Each item of new functionality should be added in an individual
change, rather than several together. This strongly correlates
tests with functionality.
o Each bug should be fixed in an individual change, rather than
several together. This strongly correlates tests with
functionality.
o Test correlations will be lost if files are moved. This is because
correlations are by name.
The best way for tests to correlate accurately with source files is
when a change contains a test and exactly those files relating to the
functionality under test. Too many spurious files will weaken the
usefulness of the testing correlations.

OPTIONS

The following options are understood:
-AUTOmatic
This option may be used to specify automatic tests. Automatic
tests require no human assistance.
-BaseLine
This option may be used to specify that the project baseline
is the subject of the command.
-BAse_RElative
This option may be used to cause relative filenames to be
considered relative to the base of the source tree. See
aeuconf(5) for the corresponding user preference.
-CUrrent_RElative
This option may be used to cause relative filenames to be
considered relative to the current directory. This is usually
the default. See aeuconf(5) for the corresponding user
preference.
-Changenumber
This option may be used to specify a particular change within
a project. See aegis(1) for a complete description of this
option.
-FOrce This option may be used to specify that all tests should be
run, even if the status of the last test run indicates that
there is no need to run a specific test.
-Help
This option may be used to obtain more information about how
to use the aegis program.
-INDependent
This option is used to specify that the test is to be run
independent of any particular change. If no tests are named,
all tests in the baseline will be run.
-List
This option may be used to obtain a list of suitable subjects
for this command. The list may be more general than expected.
-MANual This option may be used to specify manual tests. Manual tests
require some human intervention, e.g.: confirmation of some
screen behavior (X11, for instance), or some user action,
"unplug ethernet cable now".
-Not_Logging
This option may be used to disable the automatic logging of
output and errors to a file. This is often useful when
several aegis commands are combined in a shell script.
-PErsevere
This option may be used to specify that all tests should be
run, even if some fail. Defaults to the user's
persevere_preference if not specified, see aeuconf(5) for more
information.
-No_PErsevere
This option may be used to specify that the test run should
stop after the first failure. Defaults to the user's
persevere_preference if not specified, see aeuconf(5) for more
information.
-Projectname
This option may be used to select the project of interest.
When no -Project option is specified, the AEGIS_PROJECT
environment variable is consulted. If that does not exist,
the user's $HOME/.aegisrc file is examined for a default
project field (see aeuconf(5) for more information). If that
does not exist, when the user is only working on changes
within a single project, the project name defaults to that
project. Otherwise, it is an error.
-PROGress
This option may be used to specify that progress messages
should be issued before each test run or before each batch
test run in case batch_test_command field specified in project
config file (see aeuconf(5) for more information).
-No_PROGress
This option may be used to specify that progress messages
should be suppressed. This is the default.
-REGression
This option is used to specify that the regression test suite
is to be run. The regression test suite consists of all tests
in the baseline which do not appear in the change. It is an
error if there are no regression tests. You may not name
tests on the command line when using the -REGression option.
You may name individual tests to be run on the command line,
without using the -REGression option; if they are not part of
the change, the tests of the same name in the baseline will be
run.
-SUGgest [ number ]
The "aegis-Integrate_Pass" command collects test correlation
statistics when changes are integrated. This option may be
used to request that aegis suggest which tests should be run,
using these testing correlations. If no number is specified,
10 tests will be suggested. This option implies the
-REGression option.
-SUGgest_Limitminutes
This option may be used to limit the number of tests to a
certain number of minutes. They will be run from most
relevant to least relevant.
-SUGgest_Noisenumber
This option may be used to control the amount of noise
injected into the test selection performed by the -SUGgest
option. The number is a percentage of noise to be injected.
Defaults to 10 if not specified. The injection of noise
ensures that a variety of tests are run on subsequent runs,
and also some from left-field as a sanity check.
-TERse
This option may be used to cause listings to produce the bare
minimum of information. It is usually useful for shell
scripts.
-Verbose
This option may be used to cause aegis to produce more output.
By default aegis only produces output on errors. When used
with the -List option this option causes column headings to be
added.
-Wait This option may be used to require Aegis commands to wait for
access locks, if they cannot be obtained immediately.
Defaults to the user's lock_wait_preference if not specified,
see aeuconf(5) for more information.
-No_Wait
This option may be used to require Aegis commands to emit a
fatal error if access locks cannot be obtained immediately.
Defaults to the user's lock_wait_preference if not specified,
see aeuconf(5) for more information.
See also aegis(1) for options common to all aegis commands.
All options may be abbreviated; the abbreviation is documented as the
upper case letters, all lower case letters and underscores (_) are
optional. You must use consecutive sequences of optional letters.
All options are case insensitive, you may type them in upper case or
lower case or a combination of both, case is not important.
For example: the arguments "-project, "-PROJ" and "-p" are all
interpreted to mean the -Project option. The argument "-prj" will not
be understood, because consecutive optional characters were not
supplied.
Options and other command line arguments may be mixed arbitrarily on
the command line, after the function selectors.
The GNU long option names are understood. Since all option names for
aegis are long, this means ignoring the extra leading '-'. The
"--option=value" convention is also understood.

RECOMMENDEDALIAS

ERRORS

It is an error if the change is not in one of the beingdeveloped or
beingintegrated states.
It is an error if the change is not assigned to the current user.
It is an error if your have no relevant tests and no relevant
exemption.

EXITSTATUS

The aegis command will exit with a status of 1 on any error. The
aegis command will only exit with a status of 0 if there are no
errors.

ENVIRONMENTVARIABLES

See aegis(1) for a list of environment variables which may affect this
command. See aepconf(5) for the project configuration file's
project_specific field for how to set environment variables for all
commands executed by Aegis.

SEEALSO

aeb(1) build a change
aeca(1) modify the attributes of a change
aedb(1) begin development of a change
aeib(1) begin integration of a change
aent(1) add a new test to a change
aecp(1) copy an existing test into a change
aepconf(5)
project configuration file format
aeuconf(5)
user configuration file format

COPYRIGHT

aegis version 4.24.3.D001
Copyright (C) 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999,
2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 Peter
Miller
The aegis program comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY; for details use
the 'aegis-VERSionLicense' command. This is free software and you
are welcome to redistribute it under certain conditions; for details
use the 'aegis-VERSionLicense' command.